The Engine slewed to one side and descended toward thickly wooded hills at the edge of a haze-filled river valley. Distantly, marble domes and pillars gleamed in the late afternoon light. Trees rushed up, and the wings of the Engine spread wide, catching at the air like giant sails, slowing the machine. Krista stood a little, one hand on the safety line, looking over the side of the observation cavity at the dead garden and great house sprawling across the hillside below.

"Ah, just as I remember it! A gaudy ruin, filled with the stink of death!"

A thick-shouldered man with a trim waist and a fringe of close-cut gray hair strode down the landing deck of the Engine. He was dressed in the Persian style: soft linen trousers, belted with richly worked kid leather, a close-fitting shirt of silk with an embroidered ox-hide jacket over it. His nose, however, could not be mistaken for anything but a Roman nose, and a patrician one at that. His eyes, cold and gray, were restless, flickering from the roof of the house to the rank weeds that choked the old garden. A short sword of the old classical style hung from his shoulder on a leather strap, and one largeknuckled hand rode easily on it.

"You know it so well, Gaius; your boyhood home, perhaps?"

Another man, this one much shorter, descended the iron ramp that had levered out of the belly of the Engine. Within the looming dark shape was a banging as the other servants began unloading the wooden crates and boxes that held the loot of Dastagird and the libraries of the Persian savants. It was quite cool in the garden, and the smell of freshly disturbed earth thrown up by the claws of the Engine tickled at Gaius' nose.

"No, Alexandros, I grew up by the sea- at the house of my aunt. This place was a fancy of mine when I was a man. Come inside, there is something you should see."

The older man picked his way through the garden and started to mount a series of broad, flat, granite steps that led up to a high-ceilinged arcade of pillars that surrounded the house. Though he was only shod in light military boots, there was a brittle splintering sound as he set foot on the first step. Gaius stopped short, peering down at the slab under his caligulae. It had crumbled where he had stepped, cracking in a spiderweb out from under his heel. He frowned and raised a hand in warning to the other man.

Alexandros, his long golden hair tied back behind his head in two bands of copper, also stopped. Like the older man, he was alert, his clear blue eyes scanning the shadows behind the pillars and the brown ranks of trees and bushes on the slopes above the house. He turned slowly, his eyes narrowed over well-formed cheeks and nose. Unlike Gaius, he was wearing only a short white tunic and plain sandals, showing muscular thighs and well-defined biceps. The chilly winter air of central Italia did not seem to bother him. The ramp behind them rang with the tramp of more feet, and Alex turned. "Hold up, lads. Something odd is going on. Don't unload anything yet."

The servants- a collection of dark-haired Valach and Armeniansstopped and laid down their burdens. The tone of command in the youngseeming man's voice did not allow for anything but obedience. Alexandros caught Gaius' eye and nodded to the right, crouching a little. Like the older Roman, the young man carried a blade- a long, straight cavalry sword. The Persian steel rippled out of its sheath, and Alex moved off soundlessly to the left of the house. Gaius watched him for a moment, admiring the play of muscles under the smooth-toned skin and the wolflike quality of the boy.

Gaius shook his head, clearing away unimportant thoughts, and moved off to the right, his ears alert for any sound. Dead grass rustled under his feet.

"Lord Prince?" Krista stepped carefully into the gloom of the Engine. The rumbling had ceased leaving an odd echoing emptiness in the tight little rooms that ran the length of its body. Even small sounds- the tik-tik of her sandals on the metal floor- seemed large. She pushed aside the circular door that led into the specially built chamber at the heart of the machine. The well-oiled hinges rolled smoothly, revealing a room of hard-angled iron plates and a slightly raised floor. "Maxian?"

The space echoed with the sound of her voice. The flickering bluewhite light of the Engine itself illuminated her face. She moved carefully around the circumference of the room, giving a wide berth to the cage of gold and silver wire that restrained a crystalline orb resting in a cup of rune-carved iron. A high-pitched singing sound followed her as she moved, but it, too, was a sound that she had put aside from her conscious thought. Another circular doorway stood ajar on the opposite side of the room, and beyond it she thought she heard a sound.

That door swung open at her touch, too, still soundless. The room beyond was quite dark, though the intermittent blue light from the Engine picked out a vague shape. Krista quelled her fear and entered, left hand drawing her cloak behind her back to free her right arm.

Behind her, in its prison of glass and wire and powerful signs, the Engine peered after her with sad, enormous eyes. Its gossamer wings fluttered against the glass, and tiny hands picked fruitlessly at the perfectly smooth surface of its prison.

Krista waited inside the doorway, listening intently. There was the ragged sound of breathing and a sharp smell- sweat and fear- filling the space. "My lord?" She bent forward, one hand out in front of her. It touched a fold of cloth, and then cold flesh. "Ah! Can you speak?"

The flickering light picked out the Prince, huddled on the floor of his room, curled up into a ball. Sweat beaded on his forearms and the side of his forehead. Krista cursed silently and gathered him up in her arms. He was very cold, and trembling slightly. Her long fingers pressed against the side of his neck- there was a pulse, but it hammered like a forge. "What is it?" She rolled back an eyelid and found his pupils wide and black.

The Prince shuddered in her arms, and sudden warmth flushed his skin. "Get me:," he croaked, "get me out. It is too strong here."

Krista nodded sharply and laid the Prince back down gently, feeling a prickling at the back of her neck. With quick hands, she folded a blanket over him and then sprinted out of the chamber.

Her feet rang on the floor, raising the heads of the servants in the cargo space and on the landing ramp. She skidded to a stop and half crouched to see out into the garden. The house of the Egyptian Queen seemed shrunken and badly used by the weather since the previous year. The head had fallen off the sphinx beside the great doorway. The rosebushes and trees that had been growing up among the remains of the ornamental garden were dead and withered.

"Quickly," she snapped at the Valach boys sitting on the metal ramp, "get these things out of the way and into the house. You and you- come with me. The Prince needs our help."

Without looking to see if they obeyed, she spun around and ran lightly back into the bowels of the Engine. Two of the Valach padded after her, as they always did. She ducked back into the room where the Prince lay, finding him half sitting, his face showing enormous strain. She touched the blanket and jerked her hand away in surprise. The heavy wool crumbled to dust under her fingers.

"The house, get me into the house:." The Prince's voice was tight and strained.

Krista knelt and got her shoulder under his. The burlier of the two Valach got his own hairy arm around the Prince's waist. Krista heaved, and the Prince came up off the floor. Crabbing sideways, they slid out the door into the passage. The Prince was a dead weight, his limbs flopping loosely. The slave girl began to hear a sharp buzzing sound in her ears. "Don't stop," she barked at the Valach. "We must reach the house."